Licorce ACEOs

Not having any formal art education I tend to do a lot of reading to learn techniques, gain ideas, be awed by what others are doing, and get inspiration.  So I gave myself this year, 2014, to just try anything before I settle down into something and stick with it (whatever that might be).  Anyway I am reading an e-book from Nicole Caulfield about how she uses color pencil on sanded paper.  She creates portraits that look like Rembrandt, using the fade-too-dark edges and dramatic lighting - believe it or not, with color pencils.  I have worked with pastel for many years, but very little with sanded paper, pastels is the main media using this type of support, or so I thought.  Hilda - do you use it?  If so what brand do you utilize.
There are only several types of sanded paper out there (yes, it is an archival type of the sand paper found in hardware stores) from moderately expensive to what I call expensive, $10/sheet.  However, you can make your own.  Many manufacturers have pumice gel, Colorfix with color added, or you can use Clear Gesso.  Trick is to get it on evenly, and not create a pattern, however many of the manufacturered papers have a built-in pattern too, so.....  Also because it is abrasive, figured it would chew up the pastels or CP.  But oh boy, once it is on the paper, it pretty much holds it with no dust flying around like on a less toothy paper.
Anyway, there is an excellent pastel tutorial from one of the best, Diana Ponting, which can be found at Wetcanvas under pastels/Soft Pastel Learning Center (actually while I was just looking I found another one from her) and she did a larger piece of these candies on a plate/tablecloth.  I always wanted to give that a try because, yep, I just love the colors.  So here are two ACEOs (because they are small and go fast) where I tested on black paper how pastels (top photo) and color pencil (bottom photo) would lay down on sanded paper.
According to Nicole, I really needed to do the color pencil using the polychromos pencils - I have some, didn't use them, but need to dig them out and try again.  She says (and I need to keep reading her generous e-book techniques) that the poly pencils can be moved around and blended like pastels, however the main color pencils, like Prismacolors tend to just fill in the paper.  And I found that to be true, that after about 3 layers it just gets waxy and colors tend now to not change.  Again, I found that on black, it tends to eat the richness of the color pencils and even the pastels.
Another experiment for color pencil is to use either a wash of watercolor or acrylic as base coat and then try CP on top, should shorten the process and get to dark colors faster. 
Another advantage to sanded paper supports is that you can put down a layer of pastels.  I think, to help eliminate the rough look, then use rubbing alcohol to smoosh the pastel around and create a base coat that now fills in the pores of the paper and put additional layers on top.  Many folks put in the color complements as the base and then allow them to peek through the final layers, unifying the painting.  So, yep, you got it, on my trial and error "to do" list.
Got one more thing to do with this subject, I can get these at the Dollar Store, so going to have to do from "life" drawings, and of course have to eat them after completed.  Waste not, want not!!!!!  :) :)
Thanks for stopping by and hope you are having a great week.